U.S. Senate shoots down gun control measure; La. members split

Wednesday

Apr 17, 2013 at 4:27 PMApr 18, 2013 at 11:06 AM

Alan Fram and David EspoThe Associated Press

WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama and his gun control allies say Senate rejection of expanded background checks and other restrictions won’t stop their drive to reduce firearms violence.But their path to enacting gun curbs this year seems blocked by the National Rifle Association, and supporters of restrictions appear befuddled about what it will take to push legislation through this Congress.A measure to tighten gun background checks commanded a majority of senators, 54-46, but that was well short of the 60 votes needed to advance. Forty-one Republicans and five Democrats sided to scuttle the plan.Louisiana’s two senators split on the vote. Sen. Mary Landrieu, a Democrat, voted in favor of the measure. Sen. David Vitter, a Republican, voted against.“Currently, guns can be purchased online and at gun shows without any background check whatsoever, leaving a gaping hole in our gun protection system,” Landrieu said in a news release. “We must do a better job of keeping guns out of the hands of criminals. I’m confident that most people understand the importance of closing this loophole while preserving the rights of law-abiding individuals to own and use guns for hunting, sport and self-protection.”The Senate planned to vote today on two more amendments to a gun control bill. One by Sen. John Barrasso, R-Wyo., would cut aid to state and local governments that release information on gun owners. Another by Sens. Tom Harkin, D-Iowa, and Lamar Alexander, R-Tenn., would bolster federal mental health programs. But just four months after a gunman killed 20 children and six adults at an elementary school in Newtown, Conn., the Senate proved unwilling Wednesday to approve the key elements of President Barack Obama’s response to the massacre. Lawmakers rejected broader federal background checks and bans on assault weapons and high-capacity ammunition magazines, jarring gun control backers who thought Newtown would spur Congress to act and delivering a victory for the NRA and a defeat for Obama. “I see this as just Round One,” the president said at the White House, surrounded by relatives of Newtown’s victims and badly wounded former Rep. Gabrielle Giffords.Looking ahead to the 2014 congressional elections, he added, “If this Congress refuses to listen to the American people and pass common-sense gun legislation, then the real impact is going to have to come from the voters.”Obama blamed lawmakers’ fear that “the gun lobby would spend a lot of money” and accuse them of opposing the Second Amendment’s right to bear arms. But opponents of the restrictions — which would have been the most meaningful gun curbs approved by Congress in two decades — said the curbs were defeated because they wouldn’t have worked. Sen. Jim Inhofe, R-Okla., said most proposals were “predicated on one assumption that somehow we think that the criminal element will single out this one law to comply with.”Added Sen. Richard Shelby, R-Ala., of the expanded background-check plan, “This is the first step in the erosion of my rights under the Second Amendment.”The day was not a complete victory for the NRA. Senators defeated one GOP amendment requiring states that let people carry concealed weapons to honor other states’ concealed carry permits.Also rejected was a Republican proposal letting some veterans with mental problems have firearms unless a court blocks them from getting the weapons. But when the votes were over, it was gun-control advocates who seemed most perplexed about what it would take to succeed. Though an AP-GfK poll shows support for stricter gun laws receding a bit, surveys have also shown 8 in 10 or more people backing expanded background checks. “There’s never been a bigger disconnect between where the American public is on an issue and where the Senate ended up,” said Sen. Chris Murphy, D-Conn. “Tragically, it may take more mass killings,” said Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn. Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., who helped craft the bipartisan plan widening background checks, said he would continue talking to other senators to see whether there were changes he could make that would attract their votes. But he conceded he had no answer. “If I knew, we wouldn’t be talking because it would have passed,” he told a reporter.NRA lobbyist Chris W. Cox thanked lawmakers for defeating the “misguided” background check expansion, saying it would have criminalized gun transactions between friends — a charge Obama and others called untrue. Mayors Against Illegal Guns, financed by New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, called the vote “a damning indictment” of the gun lobby’s power. By agreement between GOP and Democratic leaders, all amendments debated Wednesday needed 60 of the Senate’s 100 votes to pass. While all failed, all received more than 50 votes but two: the proposed bans on assault weapons and high-capacity magazines. “Show some guts,” Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., the assault weapons ban sponsor, told her colleagues before the vote, knowing she would lose.